Review - Daco F-104 Superset

This review is still WIP as I started building the set. Come back often.

I hardly do reviews, but since I have delayed building two Belgian F-104 waiting for this set, I decided to post my impressions about the newly released F-104 Improvement & Completion Set from Daco Products.
 

 
 
This set is designed to complete the Hasegawa F-104 kits in 1/48 and covers Starfighter versions from all over the world and has the pretention to offer as many F-104 goodies as possible.
Personally I was sold with the SUU-21 practise munition dispensers, the Red Dog missile launchers I needed for the Beauvechain based interceptors and the many BDU-33 and helmets that could be used in many of my modelling projects.
 

 
 
The box contains 10 sprues of injected grey plastic, 4 identical smaller sprues molded in different transparent colors so you don't have to paint the nav lights, the usual instruction booklet and 2 decal sheets for the many Starfighter goodies.
 

 
The instruction booklet is very complete but as one can imagine is pretty different from what we are used to. Indeed having so many different versions covered by the set it's not always possible to make complete drawing for everything. So Daco put a lot of notes on each page of the instruction booklet. Each sprue part is listed in a description that gives the version that specific part is suited for. Some building tips are also included where appropriate.
I must say it took me a bit of time to get accustomed to, but once I understood the way it was meant to, it became very obvious and easy to follow.
Basically get the part number and always read the part description before working the part.

 
Sprues are packed two by two in a plastic bag. The sprues snap one into another and don't move against each other preventing damage or wear to the plastic. That's a nice arrangement, good thinking outside of the box if I might say !!
 

 
The injected plastic is very finely engraved and details are very precise. I certainly would not categorize this kit as short run. I saw a bit of flash only around some flaps and the cuts are very crisp and cleans. No doubt this moulding is up to nowadays standards, if not more.
 

 
Sprues A1 &A2 contain the rivetless wings, flaps & slats and the huge tail stab. New gear doors (with less brutal bumps than on the hasegawa kit) & nose gear,  wing pylons, 2 MB seats (GQ-7A & 1Q-7A), the opened parachute bay, canopy defogging tubes for both single seat and TF-104 & central pylon amongst other small goodies like the pitot and many different helmets. I remember trying to scratch those defogging tubes on past zippers. I'm very happy to have them this time. With the canopy open, they are very visible and dearly lacking on hasegawa models.
A very useful and weird piece is also available, it will allow the modeller to correctly angle the wings and their pylon on the fuselage by cleverly fitting into the gear hole. How smart.
I believe that both those A sprues are available separately from daco's new website.
 
The main difference of  those sprues when compared to the Hasegawa parts is the lack of rivets on the wings, stabilisator, slats, flaps and rudder.
 

 

Daco wings are just about 1mm longer than the Hasegawa's. Thickness is about the same.
The instruction clearly state that the ejector pin on the Inside of the wings needs to be sanded smooth to ensure the thiniest wing as possible. It's a nice tip as it's one of the trademark of the F-104 and daco instruction didn't miss it. 

 

 

Top: Hasegawa's ; Bottom Daco's

 

Top: Daco's ; Bottom Hasegawa's

 

Another difference is in the chord line. Daco's wing are 2mm longer in chord than hasegawa's when compared to the Daco's F-104 book.

 

 

 Top: Hasegawa's ; Bottom Daco's 

 

Comparison of the main gear door. I'll let you choose. My choice is made

 
Sprue B1& B2 Contain the diorama goodies such as the ladder, the (extra long) tow bar and the parts required to open the computer bay behind the cockpit. Some (not all) F-104S parts are also included such as the enlarged intakes which fit the hasegawa parts very well, outer wing pylons, specific wingtip pylons & J-79 MTU-J1K exhaust for Italian, German and Turkisk starfighters. On that subject Daco also provides a nice alignement cone so the modeller can easily glue the petal in place resulting in a nicely aligned exhaust. Another nice initiative.
 

 
I never opened the avionic bay on a starfighter, but no doubt my next one will have it opened. Daco provides decals to populate the area as well and most cleverly the top Hood with internal detail so the lazy modeller like me don't have to detail the hasegawa original part. More review of those parts in my next build.

 

The above picture shows how the computer bay fits with the hasegawa parts. the floor rests on the nose gear bay and contacts the aft bulkhead of the cockpit. The ammunition bay (or the auxiliary fuel tank for the F-104 without cannon) is included as well but then some minor surgery will be required on the top fuselage of Hasegawa's.

 

 

 

As clearly stated in Daco's instruction, the part holding the rubber pad holding the nose gear firmly in place needs to be reduced in height so it dos not conflict with the computer bay floor

 

 
Sprues C1 & C2 start messing with external stores: SUU-21 open or close bombbay (the doors were actually added to avoid unintentional release over europe densely populated areas,  Viccon recce pod, two orpheus pod (NL and Italy). That NL orpheus will go on a F-16, no doubt.
Secapem Target towing (only one - for a belgian target tow I think you need two - but the second container should be empty, so no big deal - I'm even wondering why then they loaded two - maybe for weigt and balance?) and the modified secapem reel container for the KLU tow system, but strangely no dart that should go on the other wing. Indeed the dart was Under one wing and the reel was Under the other wing, both were connected together with a cable that was attached (before release) just Under the exhaust) It is strange that DAco decided to offer the reel but not the corresponding dart. the system then is incomplete and can't really be used. 
You will also find LAU-32 & 3/A rocket pods. German, Netherland and Belgium specific dispensers for training bombs and a couple of air intake FOD cover.
 

 
Sprues D1 & D2 are also available separately from daco website and cover the extra wing tanks (they can be configured as wingtip or wing bags) and the air to air missiles (AIM-9B, AIM-9J/N, AIM-9L) You get two of each. The missiles are finely detailled and the fins are very thin. The protective head cover are also included, you get 2 pieces of 4 different types. Another nice touch.
Also provided: Red Dog missile launchers, ventral catamarans rails and German navy chaff & flares ejectors (1 for each side of the aft fuselage)
 

 
Sprues E1 & E2 are devoted to more stores, special cargo with a lot of rarely seen nuclear bombs like the B43, B57 & B61. One could contest the display of those evil weapons but they made our history and I salute the guts of Daco to actually make them. The F-104 was a very important vector of that strategy therefore they needed to be in this set IMHO. You are free to use them or not  after all :)
More air to air missiles are also available: Aspide (1), Sparrow (1) and some air to surface  missiles AS-30 missile (1) & Kormoran (1) and their respective pylons.
A travel pod is also included in these sprues as well as two twin carrier stores.
 

 
And here I think we can find the main drawback of this set. Like the Secapem pod for the Belgian starfighter and the modified secapem for the KLU target tow system from sprues C, we can only find one of the store that usually are carried by two. So if you want to have a correctly laden aircraft you will need to buy two sets or source the missiles eleswhere. I think Daco ran out of place but maybe it would have been more useful to discard the incomplete target tow systems and add the missing pairs. That said, I'd do the opposite, keep the target tow and scratch the missile which can be easily found :) okay, okay that's because I plan on actually building a Belgian target towing Starfighter!
 
Sprues F are dealing with transparent parts which you won't have to paint. Excellent idea, especially with adding multiple parts of rarely moulded goodies that can be used about everywhere in aircraft scale modelling: BDU-33 (12), BDU-48 (12), helmet visors, lights, Hud, missile heads, ladder steps etc etc.

 
It may have increased the cost by a very small amount, but I find this idea very clever, well done Daco.
 

So: "Do you need this set?"

Well Hasegawa models of the F-104 are pretty good already but the rivets might be too visible. Sure you can fill them, it's easy enough to do on the wings, slats and flaps and the huge stab. But Hasegawa's models are also very simple and don't provide much specific parts. You can't open the avionic bay or the parachute container, you only get two tiptanks, no wing pylon or store to hang from there. I haven't seen their F-104S kit so I don't know if they have the specific sprues of the S model.

So with this set you can basically build any starfighter with any boxing. From the F-104A & C to Belgians (interceptors from Beauvechain or Strikers from Kleine Brogel) and Germany (Luftwaffe or Navy) and Dutch G's, Canada's CF-104, Italians S, TF-104G, RF-104G, F-104G from Volkel (NL) without forgetting Norway, Turkey and Denmark Starfighters
And you will have lots of extra for other projects like rarely seen stores (specials, BDUs, ...) and diorama accessories like ladder and tow bars and intake covers.

I have two belgian starfighters to build. A F-104G and a TF-104G. I wanted to build them both from the 1st wing at Beauvechain. Those guys were the fighter wing doing mainly air to air (Kleine Brogel 10W was the bomber wing) but I can't build the hasegawa's as fighters as I don't get the red dog missiles to mount the AIM-9 rather than the wingtip tanks. Equally you can't really have a loaded 10W (bomber) belgian starfighter because you get no weapons dispenser. So even for a belgian Keebee based F-104 I'd need this set.

If you're building Italian S starfighters, there is no doubt in my mind that this set will be necessary as the S have many specific items that the daco set covers fully.
Same goes for the recce RF-104G with their weird pods and camera suite or the typical equipped german Navy F-104.

No doubt you will have a lot of parts remaining after your project as this set is purposedly made for many different F-104 at once. So if you have only one Starfighter to build, you'll have many extra to trade afterwards, which is a nice trend going on in different web communities nowadays. The price of the set is around 50 euros. It's not cheap considering the price of nowadays injection kit but there is no doubt in my mind that it is the work of passionate people who didn't count their time developping this update set - like the true modeller amongst us. And when you consider that some people (like me) are ready to spend 30 euros on resin exhaust, 25 euros on resin cockpit and 20 euros on PE fret for the same model .... then this injection improvement set becomes very cheap. You get more with less money.

My only drawback before actually building it is the lack of double stores where needed (Aspide, Sparrows, Secapem target tow and Air to Surface missiles .... and no C2 early seats :)

Regardless I will definitely recommend it for any 1/48 starfighter project.
And as Danny said: Have fun building it. I sure will have very shortly.

The F-104 improvement set is available from http://www.dacoproducts.com
I was not asked to make a review

The review sample was paid in full 

 

Rafale "Nounou" 1/48

Nounou" is the french term for Buddy refuelling





My last model(s) off the bench is an inflight display of two Rafale Marine M08 & M12 Buddy refuelling somewhere over the mediteranean sea during operation Harmattan, the allied actions in Lybia. The image below shows what i wanted to achieve:

The first kit (the nounou) will be the Hobby Boss and the second (the bomber) will be the Revell boxing updated with the bomb racks.

The Revell decals looks much better - They were designed by Syhart decals. The Hobby boss decals are white and hi vis, so they can't be used for this project. Furthermore, the anchor is not centred on the french roundels. I'll thus be looking to buy an extra decal set for the refueller. I simply asked Revell of Germany if i could buy an extra sheet from them and i must say they have a real great Customer service !! That said, with the market price of the revell boxing, i would get the sheet and the model for 23 euros, which is barely more than an aftermarket decal sheet alone ;) That was my backup plan.

The molds are close to one another and at first I actually thought they were the same. But after looking better, they are different all right.
The Revell looks better detailed and close to a modern standard where the Hobbyboss seems to be one of the earlier versions.
The Hobby boss doesn't have the chaff& flares ejectors and the wheels are ugly which is luckily irrelevant for this build.

The Revell has a targetting pod included but the instruction doesn't mention it at all. The specific pylon is also included. They also give you the rear fuselage AA pylons without mentionning anything about it in the instructions.
Both kit suffer from one huge drawback: the intakes are left open and lack the very distinctive intake ducts of the rafale.
D-molds made seamless intakes for them, but I wans't able to source them, they seem OOP. That's too bad as I would realy like to get a pair of them for this project.

Weaponwise, I'll load the refueller with the wing tanks from the Hobby boss boxing. They give you 2 large subsonic wing bag and 2 smaller supersonic wing bags. perfect configuration for a Marine "nonou". I'll probably have to scratch the Douglas refuel pod.
The receiving aircraft will be laden with 4 (I wish I could use 6, but apparently it wasn't done often in the french marine, especially not from a carrier) GBUs, 2 subsonic wing bags and the targetting pod on the chin pylon, and of course the standard AA missile on the wingtips.
I'll also get the handsome rafale pilots from PJ for the inflight scene

the PJ pilots are great but a real nightmare to get into the pits. first the stick is on the right in the rafale and the PJ pilots have the stick in the middle. No big deal since the pit space is soo small that nobody will notice anything anyway. the legs of the pilots had to be cut otherwise they wouldn't fit under the IP and the arms greatly conflict with the glareshield. Lots of surgery were needed on the poor pilots Jean and Philippe :)
that being said the helmet is great and they are very specific to the rafale, so i'm glad to have them.

The resin bits for the hobby boss kit to model the chaff & flares near the flaps went in very easily

 The wings were a bit bothersome to fit and it's much better to insert a mini strip of platic on the bottom half so they don't sag down. The intakes were requiring quite a bit of putty to be mated to the fuselage, but that was expected.

The biggest issue for me with the intake is that fact that you see all the way through the exhaust. I simply decided to shut them closed internally with a sheet of plasticard. Not ideal I agree but it's already halfway beter than to see the innards of the exhaust :)

 
The internal supports for the rods were glued Inside the fuselages with two component epoxy putty. The supporting rods will be slided in at later stages.

 
the noses are giving me a bit of trouble. i have three, the resin wolfpack, the revell and the hobby boss. When i compare them i can say that the HB seems weird.

 

The Revell and HB noses have a direction pin so i can't go wrong. but the resin nose isn't directionnal, so there is a potential to glue it with a wrong angle.

 

And the same with the hobby boss nose mated to the hobby boss model

 The end of fuselage plane is not the same from the revell to the hobby boss kit it seem, so the nose differences noticed on the flat table aren't so obvious once the noses are dry fitted on their respective model.
Still at this stage, i am really not sure which way to glue the resin nose. Matter of fact i don't even know if it's better than the stock HB nose...

Both kits have been fully assembled and primed with Mr Surfacer 1000. I finally decided to discard the resin nose and use Hobby boss'. Both kit need extensive putty, extensive sanding as it seems the moulds weren't perfectly aligned and everyting you glue will require putty.

Closing the gear door was rather easy compared to the usual model, gluing the wings to the fuselage required plastric strips under the wing to get the correct angle and to minimize  putty use. The intakes needed quite a lot of putty and the nose as well

The way the kit was engineered is especially weird around the nose gear bay. Lots of sanding required there unless you force the innards to be separated to accomodate the gear bay part. As a result, many kits of the rafale are seen with that awful line where the gear bay part is mated to the fuselage. The fuselage joints below the cockpit are not easy to sand smooth without loosing too much detail.

Both canopy were actually easy to get in place closed, which is hardly the case on most kits. Progress on the Revell:

 

 

Although not correct and not as nice as the L'arsenal pod, I'll use the targetting pod included in the Revell boxing but omitted from the documentation, the chin pylon is already glued in place:

Flaps are separated on HB and attached on Revell, no big deal, they both need to be in for this inflight display
 Progress on the Hobby Boss:

The gun covers and spent cartridge ejector in resin from Wolfpack were used on the HB kit

 

The wingtip pylons of the hobby boss have been replaced with the Wolfpack design - they are shorter and look nicer.
 
Some work on the nose, the HB nose has the static lines too much forward, so they were filled in and replaced with plastic strips which were in turn sanded down (some still need more sanding). I did the same with the revell nose to maintain a semblance of unity in the diorama. The bottom one is longer than the others
 

 

  
The wing bags (at least the larger subsonic ones) were redone using streched sprue. the structure lines are soldering lines. I also detailled a bit more the underside of the wing bags
 

 
 
Both models were then preshaded with dark grey and painted with a mix 75/25 of H306/H307. Then the Inside of the panels were quickly and dirty sprayed with a lighter shade of H306:
 

 

 
Both model were then blended down with a mist of H306. Some antenna and heat plates painted with alclad.
 

 

 

 

 

 
Since I have three rafales to do, I invested in one of the Syh@rt decal sheet which has the walkways masks in vinyl. Nothing you can't do with masking tape, but way quicker. The masks are reusable with a bit of care.

The difference in wingtips

The body of the GBU were painted but I'm not happy with the contrast between the greens, so those go back to the paint booth.

That's better !

Decal time !!
I wanted to stick to the original picture but couldn't do M9, so it will be M12 refuelled by M8.

 

M12 will carry two mica IR and probably to EM Under the belly and M8 will have 2 magic2 on wingtips

 

 

The wing bags of M8 have a bit of artistic licence with the commemorative colours decals. I figured that since M8 would stay over friendly territory, why not :)

 

Next is the refuel pod story
The french navy use the Douglas B827 refuelling pod on centreline stations of the etendard and the rafale.
Since starting that project i knew that scratching the pod would be one of the challenges of this project.

 

AFAIK, the pod is only available in the Heller Super Etendard, afghan warrior boxing in 1/48. A kit I don't have but a friend lent me the parts so I could study them. I also have the Douglas D-704 Buddy pod used on intruder and skyhawk. Since both are Douglas, I took all wing tanks from douglas aircraft in the stash and started looking for possibilities:

 

 

From top to bottom:
D-704 from Cobra Company , Intruder wing bag, Corsair wingbag, Spad wing tank and the B827 pod from the Super etendard kit.

By measuring diameter and lenght, I chosed the A-7 corsair tank.
Cut the tank in 5 parts and assembled the two relevant ones together to come with the same lenght and about the same diameter as the french pod. It's a bit shallower and longer, but that will do.

 

After sanding and engraving , I added the bumps from various stashes (F-16 1/32, A-4 1/32 and made the prop with some PE bits
Some more sanding, painting and detailling and the rafales will have a half decent refuel pod.

 

 

The bomber rafale has been completed first:

 

 



Then the  "nounou" system is completed

 

 

 

 

The hose is 27cm (13m in 1/48) long and 1mm in diameter (50mm 1/1)

The hardest thing was to scracth the drogue. It was done with different plastic cylinders cut to lenght, some metal rods disposed in a cone and glued on the outer side on a bigger circle cut out from thin plasticard.
The outside of the drogue was then circled with toilet paper mixed with white glue.

Luckily I was able to find some dimensions of the real system:

 

 

 

 

 

The last to be completed was the refueller:

And finally all three subassemblies are displayed together and the project is completed.

 

 

 

 

 

Lame attempt at making both rod disappear in this frontal shot

 

 

The same without the support rods

 

 

The project took 6 months of happy modelling to complete !